It is known from U.S. Pat. No. 3,735,183 to produce a gas discharge panel including a plurality of discharge cells comprising a block of electrically insulating material containing a plurality of gas-filled cavities arranged in a two-coordinate rectangular array, a first set of electrical conductors adjacent one end of the cavities and in contact with the discharge gas each conductor of the set forming first electrodes of those cells associated with a unique value of one coordinate of the array, a plurality of second electrodes each being located adjacent the other end of an individual cavity and in contact with the discharge gas, a plurality of electrically resistive elements each of which is connected to a different second electrode, and a second set of electrical conductors each conductor of the second set interconnecting the resistive element of the cells associated with a unique value of the other coordinate of the array. Such a display device is hereinafter referred to as "of the type described."
One of the limitations of gas discharge display panels of the type described is the relative complexity of the circuitry required to address individual cells of the panel to strike or extinguish discharges therein.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,787,753 concerns a gas discharge display panel of the type described having a glow transfer device including a plurality of pairs of spaced electrodes in a common gas-filled discharge space, one electrode of each of the pairs comprising a conductor of one of said sets and the other electrode of each of the pairs extending parallel to said one electrode, the arrangement being such that sequential energisation of said other electrode of the pairs of electrodes causes a discharge formed between the electrodes of each pair to scan along the glow transfer device by the mechanism of glow transfer and change the potential of each of said one electrodes of the pair of electrodes in turn.
The amount to which the other electrode extends parallel to the conductor forming said one electrode depends on the current which has to pass through the transfer device discharge when striking all of the discharge cells associated with the conductor. In panels used primarily for displaying alphanumeric signals, each of which requires a 7.times.5 array of cells, the panels may be conveniently made in the form of an N.times.7 or N.times.16 array of cells, that is, one or two characters high by n(N/6) characters long and one or two blank cells between characters. Several of such panels may be placed side-by-side or end-to-end to provide a larger display area.
It has been found in such a display that where the one electrode of the glow transfer device forms the conductor common to the 7 or 16 cells, the other electrode has only to extend to provide a common area of the same order of magnitude as the area of the conductor adjacent the end of a cavity; and it is an object of this invention to provide a gas discharge display device, including a glow transfer device, of simple construction.